Like mainstream Democrats, Herbie Wesson prefers oratorical chaos to order.

He was sailing along in his thank-you speech for being re-elected president of the Los Angeles City Council the other day when he suddenly decided to stick a sharp needle in his eye.

In a lunging quest for attention from extremists in the midst of his welfare-laden agenda, he dropped the phony bomb that always is balm for his crowd.

Racism. Boo.

Then he served dessert.

Hatred. Boo.

Illegal help for illegal aliens. Boo.

C’mon, Mr. Wesson.

Tell me how pervasive racism is in Los Angeles.

For attention, he opened his talk with a story built for sympathy.

Unable to think up a contemporary illustration of racism, Mr. Wesson designed a tale that supposedly happened to him 53 years ago.

He grew up in Cleveland in the 1960s when one quarter of the population was black. Cleveland has a rich black history.

Mr. Wesson was and is diminutive.

He claimed that one sunny day when he was 12 years old, he set out for the movies. A group of white men appeared, called him racist names and threw a milkshake at him.

Therefore?

After identifying a number of recent hate incidents, Mr. Wesson declined to propose a solution

He closed the subject with a meaningless observation.

“We cannot stand by and allow bad people to roll back the clock on the progress we have made.”